he's home

The beast came home tonight. They say he did well overnight and have switched him back to two insulin shots a day. He still is not eating much and is doing nothing but sleeping since he came home. I had a call from from the internist department at a big state vet school. His doc had called in a referral. I thought she had just called to ask some questions, I didn't realize she wanted him to go there for testing and exams. I haven't decided yet if I'm going to do that. The basic exam and blood work is between six and eight hundred dollars. If he had to spend the night or had to have anything else done, it would go up dramatically. Plus, since the school is almost two hours away, I'd have to take a day or two off from work.

I don't know what to do. I told the internist that I wanted to talk to his doctor and get a better understanding of what they are hoping to get from this. He is only eleven years old. That doesn't seem so old for a lab. My dad's lab lived to be seventeen. But the doctor says that because he has had diabetes for so long (six years) that he is really much older.

Ugh.. maybe after I talk to the doctor I'll feel better or at least know which way to go.

Thanks for keeping him in your thoughts.

Blessings
~*~

beastie update

The beast is spending the night at the emergency vet tonight. The vet is concerned that something else is wrong and that is why he can't get regulated with the insulin. They are running a 24 hour glucose curve and so he stays there tonight and in the morning I pick him up and take him back to the regular vet. I assume it is to finish the rest of the glucose curve.

I did make it back to work today. It wasn't too bad a day, long because I was late getting there and had to stay later than usual to make up the time. Tonight will be cold since I don't have my four legged heater with me. :-(

My tarheels play again tonight, so I'm looking forward to that. Hopefully they have their heads in the game and play well.

Anyway, I have nothing else to share tonight. Thanks for all you kind support for the beast. I'm hoping that everything will be okay.

Blessings,
~*~

doggie business

My poor baby boy had to go to hospital today...he has a hematoma in his ear and it needed surgery to repair. Unfortunately, after the exam this morning and hearing my description of some issues we had this weekend - he's been leaving little cow pies behind when he sleeps and also couldn't get into the car by himself, i had to lift his back end for him - the doc decided that we should not put him under anesthesia.

I can't tell you how happy I was to hear this. When I dropped him off this morning, I had a very hard time leaving him. I felt very nervous about the surgery. He is getting older, he's 11 now - but with his diabetes the vet said its more like 15 or so, and he seems to be falling apart.

They drained his ear and wrapped it all up in a bandage. We will have to go back every other day to have the bandage changed for a while. He had this same problem about a year or so ago, except it was the other ear. He looks a little funny and is currently on the floor beside the sofa, snoring to beat the band. At least they wrapped him with a carolina blue bandage. We like our tarheel blue around here...after all, we have tarheel hearts. :-)

Blessings,
~*~

Sunday ramblings...

He came home today. His glucose is up (way up) and he was stable so they sent him home. They lowered his insulin dose and I'm to check in with my regular vet tomorrow. He has been quiet today for the most part. I was looking back through the blog and realized that it has only been about 3 weeks since his last episode. He also had one in November. It seems they are coming a lot more frequently now. Sigh...




I slept about 3 hours last night and took a nap this afternoon for about an hour. I'm wiped out. I'm trying to stay awake through the UNC game. I don't think I'll swim in the morning. I need to get some sleep, it is going to be a busy day at work. I've become increasingly unhappy there. I had made up my mind to not let it get to me and to keep my temper and my thoughts about it to myself when I'm at work. It took 2 and 1/2 days to break that 'resolution'. On Friday I had a run in with a co-worker and I have now decided to seriously look for another job. I am going to look in the area of "the property" or at least no more than 30 minutes from there. All I need is a job within that area that pays equal to what I currently make, and I can buy the property.
So, I'm on a mission. Two missions really, one to find the job and the other to buy that property. Meanwhile, I have to keep my cool at work. I have to stop stressing over the things that I cannot change and just do my job to the best of my abilities. I also need to take time to do things for me. I have not knitted a single stitch since December 22nd. Knitting class starts back on Tuesday so I'll have at least 2 hours a week where I will be knitting. I want to do some other creative things. I want to work on my photography and I have several ideas rolling around in my head for craft projects. I need to make the time!

Well, I have rambled on enough for tonight. I just have to hang on for another 20 minutes or so until the end of the game, then I can go to sleep. zzzzz....

Blessings,
~*~

First Saturday Sky of 2008

I spent my day taking down the Yule tree and putting away the holiday decorations. I have left up some of my snow decorations and will leave them until spring. Right now I wish spring was a million miles away. I need snow. I need cold. To me, winter doesn't exist without snow. Maybe in a week or two. This week it is forecast to get into the 70's. How depressing...

In other news, I took the Saturday Sky photo this afternoon while sitting at a stop light. I was on my way to the emergency vet with my dog. He spent over an hour laying completely still. He just would not budge at all. When he finally did get up, he wandered aimlessly around the house for about 30 minutes. He would not sit, he wouldn't be still. I gave him a little food and he continued to act the same. The wandering is usually a sign that a seizure is not far behind. So, off to the vet we went. They took him back and came out a little while later to say that his glucose was too low. They are keeping him at least overnight to monitor and try to get it higher. They will call in the morning and let me know if I can bring him home or if they should continue to keep him. I will have to contact his regular vet on Monday to see what is next.

The house feels different without him here. I'm trying to figure out how I'm going to sleep and stay warm tonight. I've had him sleeping beside me for 10 years. He is nice and cuddly and very warm. Hopefully, he will only be gone tonight. I'll have to throw some extra blankets on the bed.

Well, I'm going to do some job hunting online and get ready for the Steelers game at 8. I hope they win.

Blessings,
~*~

Doggie post

Meet Dylan, my four-legged baby, otherwise known as The Beast. He has been talked about here before and there have been pictures of him here and here too. He is a black Labrador Retriever and turned 10 years old this past November. He is one of the sweetest dogs you could ever meet. He is a big dog and has a big bark which has not helped the myriad of migraines that I seem to be afflicted with on a semi-regular basis.

When Dylan was six, he was diagnosed with Diabetes. For the past four years I have scheduled my life around his insulin shots. He can only eat special dog food designed for diabetics and he gets two shots a day, 12 hours apart. When he was first diagnosed he was a nice big lab and weighed in at around 110 pounds. Now he is down to around 84 pounds.

After the second year of changing the amount of insulin every couple of weeks I asked the doctors if they could look to see if there was something else wrong with him that could be causing more problems. They said his behavior was normal for diabetics. I felt they were wrong.

Over the past several months, his insulin requirements have jumped dramatically and he has been having more of his “spells”. He has seizures and episodes where he is very wobbly and can’t walk up and down stairs or get up and down from the bed. A few weeks ago I rushed him to the emergency vet at midnight on a Friday night because his eyes looked as if they had sunken into his head. They diagnosed him with something called Horner’s Syndrome, which is a dying of the nerve endings around the eyes and causes the lids to droop.

Last Tuesday, I happened to be home during the day due to a migraine, when he had another episode. I took him to the vet and the new doctor there did some tests that came back relatively normal for a diabetic dog. However, she was very concerned about his constant episodes and wanted to do more testing. Today he went in for an ultrasound of the abdomen and also to have his ears checked. She was planning to lightly sedate him so that she could get a look down deep into his ears, the middle ear, I think.

She called a few minutes ago and said that the ears looked good, except for being dirty (they were just cleaned last week) and a slight infection. The ultrasound showed an abnormal nodule on his spleen. They aspirated it and are going to do a cytology (sp?) on it to see if it is a regenerative tumor or something else. She said that with the regenerative kind, there are normally more than one at a time. She is also concerned that he has a pancreas problem. She said there is a lot of muscle wasting around his head and also in his legs and that the pancreas problem could be causing that because his body is probably not getting enough nutrients from his food to help him and he is literally starving to death.

I’m very concerned about him. I have already lost Jade and my Grandmother and an uncle this year, not to mention my dad’s 16 year old lab. I don’t know if I can take another loss right now. I may be jumping the gun, but I just don’t have a good feeling about this.

As with Jade, I don’t want Dylan to be in pain. He always looks like so sad, but I don’t know if that is the Horner’s Syndrome or if he is in pain. My mum said yesterday that I need to think about how far I’m willing to go to diagnose his issues and treat them. I spend about $250 per month on food and insulin for him. That does not include all the vet trips and tests they have to run to monitor his condition. I know today’s bill is going to be a huge. I will be surprised to get out of there for less than $500.

Well, I just felt like talking about my dog today. Hopefully, these latest tests will reveal the problem and a suitable treatment will be found.

Blessings,

~*~